These National Institutes of Health (NIH) Research Conference Grants (R13 and U13) support programs are relevant to public health and to the scientific mission of the participating institutes and centers and GSA.

Publication Series

GSA offers the Communicating with Older Adults publication series. Each installment is intended for any professional who seeks to have the best possible interactions with older adults. They cover the broad range of communication issues experienced by older adults and health care providers, and give concrete suggestions for dealing with problems when they arise.

Current Titles

Communicating with Older Adults: An Evidence-Based Review of What Really Works

Silver Market Training Modules

At present, older adults account for 34 percent of all prescription drug use and 30 percent of over-the-counter drug use. The U.S. Administration on Aging forecasts that nearly one in five Americans will be 65 or older by 2030. And according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, two-thirds of older adults currently are unable to understand the information given to them about their prescription medications.

GSA is now offering its members free access to several online training modules designed to help pharmacy professionals meet the needs of their aging patients. And while these tools are geared toward pharmacists and other support staff, they can be useful to any gerontologists seeking to have optimal interaction with the aging population. Collectively known as The Silver Market Community Pharmacy series, each installment runs less than 25 minutes and offers expert information and time-tested techniques to help pharmacists and technicians work efficiently and respectfully across the counter.

GSA developed the modules with support from several partners, including McNeil Consumer Healthcare, Novartis Consumer Health, Pfizer Consumer Healthcare, and Purdue Pharma. GSA’s technology partner in hosting the series is LearnSomething, Inc.

The need for family caregivers in the U.S. is rapidly increasing, yet demographic shifts are causing the pool of potential family caregivers to decrease. Currently, nearly 18 million people in this country provide some form of care for loved ones age 65 or older.

Capitol Hill Briefing and Proceedings Paper

"Congressional Stories of Family Caregiving: Challenges, Rewards, and a Call to Action" is a proceedings paper from a GSA-hosted briefing on Capitol Hill. GSA invited these legislators to share their personal stories of family caregiving to illustrate that the caregiving experience and the challenges that accompany it are shared by Americans of all levels of income, employment, and education. The briefing was supported by The John A. Hartford Foundation and partners were AARP, the Alzheimer’s Association, and the National Alliance for Caregiving. This paper includes recommendations from the "Families Caring for an Aging America" report below as well as caregiving-relevant legislation.

"Families Caring for an Aging America" Report

With support from 15 sponsors, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened an expert committee to examine what is known about the nation’s family caregivers of older adults and to recommend policies to address their needs and help to minimize the barriers they encounter in acting on behalf of an older adult.

The resulting report, "Families Caring for an Aging America," provides an overview of the prevalence and nature of family caregiving of older adults as well as its personal impact on caregivers’ health, economic security, and overall well-being. It also examines the available evidence on the effectiveness of programs and interventions designed to support family caregivers. The report concludes with recommendations for developing a national strategy to effectively engage and support them.

Donna Wagner*, Dean, College of Health and Social Services, New Mexico State University

Jennifer Wolff*, Associate Professor, Department of Health Policy and Management, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University

GSA’s work to amplify and move the report recommendations toward implementation are funded in part through a grant from the John A. Hartford Foundation.

A team of experts assembled by GSA, has been charged with guiding GSA in the development of valuable, credible, and trusted resources to provide awareness of all aspects of Human-Animal Interaction (HAI) as it relates to aging, and to help in advance scientific research endeavors.

Life expectancy has vastly increased in many parts of the world, and while pet ownership and other types of HAI have demonstrated benefits to human health, very little is known about the potential role that pets may play in healthy aging.

The expert panel on Human Animal Interaction seeks a multidisciplinary approach to this emerging field of study, through increased research in the roles of companion animals in the lives of older adults, such as mitigating loneliness, social isolation, and depression; and enhancing mobility and cognitive function.

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Funding

GSA, in collaboration with Mars Petcare/WALTHAM™, is funding high quality, innovative research into the impact of companion animals on healthy aging in humans. Through a $50,000 award in 2017, we will promote innovation and enable the conduct of high-quality research on the impact of HAI (pet ownership or other forms of interaction) on healthy aging in older adults (50+ years of age) and/or their caregivers.

The recipients of the award were announced in July at the International Association of Gerontology and Geriatrics World Congress: Drs. Dawn Carr and Natalie Sachs-Ericsson from Florida State University. Dawn and Natalie will be using the Health and Retirement Survey, which includes a module on Human Animal Interaction, to study four aims that will test the hypothesis that a companion animal is beneficial to health in older people, particularly those who are socially isolated and experience a major social loss:

Identify critical factors that predict selecting a companion animal later in life, particularly in relation to health, and to understand the selection processes that may influence the benefits of companion animals on older adults

Determine if and in what ways human social processes are involved in shaping the relation between companion animals and human health.

Examine the influence of companion animals on health among socially isolated older adults relative to socially integrated older adults who experience a major social loss

Contribute to a theoretical framework outlining the relationships between human-animal interaction among older adults and human health

This study uses an underutilized data set and will help us to better understand how social context shapes the relevance of companion animals for a range of health problems later in life, particularly for vulnerable older adults.

Expert Panel at Advancing Research on Human-Animal Interactions in Human Aging, April 25-26, 2016

Marie-José Enders-Slegers, PhD, MScProfessor in AnthrozoologyDepartment AnthrozoologyFaculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Open University Heerlen, The Netherlands

Layla Esposito, PhD, MAProgram Officer of the Child Development and Behavior BranchEunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development National Institutes of HealthRockville, MD

Erika Friedmann, PhDProfessorAssociate Dean of ResearchUniversity of Maryland School of NursingBaltimore, MD

James A. Griffin, PhDDeputy Chief of the Child Development and Behavior Branch Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development National Institutes of HealthRockville, MD

John G. Haaga, PhDActing Director, Division of Behavioral and Social ResearchNational Institute on AgingNational Institutes of HealthBethesda, MD

Nancy Morrow-Howell, MSW, PhDBettie Bofinger Brown Distinguished Professor of Social PolicyDirector of the Harvey A. Friedman Center for Aging Washington University in St. LouisSt. Louis, MOGSA President

This program is developed by GSA and supported by Mars Incorporated and WALTHAM, the Petcare research division of Mars.

The Gerontological Society of America launched an oral health initiative with the goals of enabling older adults to maintain their oral health as part of a healthy aging process and to assist researchers, educators, practitioners, and policymakers to identify areas of needed activity and research on the topic of oral health in older adults.

A key focus of the initiative is advancing the belief that helping older adults maintain good oral health involves oral health professionals and also an interprofessional team of “oral health champions”, including primary care and specialty physicians, nurses, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, social workers, psychologists, physical and occupational therapists, and others who can advocate for, educate about, and provide direct care supporting oral health.

This multi-faceted initiative is comprised of a variety of interrelated elements including:

The Oral Health Workgroup, a team of experts charged with increasing awareness and understanding of the importance of appropriate oral care and strengthening the impact that all members of healthcare and caregiver teams have on ensuring good oral care for older adults. The GSA Workgroup on Oral Health seeks an interprofessional approach to improved oral health for all older adults.

The GSA Oral Health Interest Group, providing an opportunity for persons interested in the issue of oral health as an essential element of healthy aging to meet, exchange, information and resources, and make contacts with persons who have similar interests.

The development and publication of the What's Hot newsletter, "Oral Health: An Essential Element of Healthy Aging." Intended for an interprofessional audience, this publication discusses the impact of poor oral health in older adults, relationships between oral health, systemic conditions, functional abilities, and healthy aging, as well as current challenges and potential opportunities in the area of geriatric oral health.

The convening of an Oral Health Forum in March 2017 of leading experts and key stakeholders committed to healthy aging to identify solutions and create a roadmap to improving the interprofessional oral health care of older adults. More than 40 participants from industry, government, academia, research, practice, and not-for profit membership organizations attended. Recommendations of the participants were incorporated into the July 2017 white paper (see below).